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From the archives: Tothe International scenes from recording of an album (by crunchy.dk 21. September 1999)

HA! You thought you were finally rid of Tothe International. Maybe you heard that Matt moved back to Hamburg, and maybe you even know about Miko leaving the band.
Well, both things are quite true, but this is NOT the end of Tothe.

Matt has in fact moved back to Hamburg in order to finish his finnish(!) studies at the University. He left the fair city of Copenhagen before summer, but has been back twice to record more songs from the forthcoming Tothe album (and get drunk at the Roskilde Festival, and play at VibraCrunch). He is right now working his ass of writing his thesis, but in between he has found the time to book a couple of German dates for Tothe. The band will play Hamburg (Bar Do Sul on friday the 29th) and Berlin (TBA on sturday 30th) in the last weekend of October and also do the very last recording for the album.

Miko has left Tothe International. Sad but true. This whacky person has been the central person of the band for many years although he doesn’t write songs, can’t play a musical instrument or even sing to save his life. Somehow it has always been a cool thing about the band that they had this guy hanging around on stage only adding a few shouts or noises to the music. Through the years Miko’s position has gained power, though. He has grown into a really great tambourine player, and as his arsenal of toy instruments and noise makers grew, his small ”pieces” became more and more important to the actual music. So it is truly
sad that Miko has decided he wants to hang out somewhere else, but as he puts it himself: ”I’m not a musician. I’m not interested in making music.
I just like being on stage and getting drunk.” ”Well, Miko”, one might reply, ”Getting drunk on stage IS what being a musician is all about!”
Of course the band totally respects his decision, and the rest of the guys are now working out a new live format, that will enable them to still have a superfluous guy on stage. This might involve more sequenced drums, samplers or maybe 1 or more new members, but that is for the future.

Right now Tothe is focusing all their brainergy on the new album. They have recorded 9 new songs and are in the process of mixing them. In the fall they will complete 2 or 3 more songs thus compiling a wonderful new album. To gain absolute freedom and control over the production, the band and producer/technician/live-mixer Ueffeuno ”Knubi” Lauesen decided to invest in hard disc recording equipment which will enable them to fuck up the recordings real good. The use of the computer also provides an almost unlimited number of tracks supplying Tothe with the opportunity to use even more strange and unusual instruments.

The last benefit is that the mad scientists can write music they don’t have to worry about being able to play.The recordings have been made primarily in the rehearsal room, but also in the living rooms of Nalna and Uffe.
The new album will feature instruments such as vacuum cleaners, the old whiskey bottle (known from Steak), double bass, Farfisa Organ, the mighty Banjoe, steel guitar, water splashes, 5-double theremin-solo and the whole standard Tothey bag of tricks administered by Miko, who IS indeed appearing on the record delivering both outstanding tambourine performances and letting
his beautiful voice be heard on several tracks.

There are two problems, however!

The first problem left is: What is the record going to be called? Some of the suggested working titles are: ”Yes, Steak….”, ”Bring on the swear jar”, ”mælk!”, ”We can’t afford Steak”, ”Glued Down Rubber Bar”, ”Ernst Madsen”, ”Kondi” etc.

The second problem is: what the hell is the band going to be called? As you surely know Tothe released their debut ”Candy’s Speech” under the name of Death Tothe, then came ”Steak” by Tothe International, and now it would of course be the easy way out to call the band International Death, but nobody said it was supposed to be easy. The band need a new name – preferably containing the word ”Tothe” (for SOME kind of continuity)

Can you help? Got any suggestions? E-mail the band through their band-page here at the Crunchy Frog web site or just write them at: